Let me start by saying that these are my words and thoughts and while I am trying to give an overview of our SBC Voices team, I am responsible for whatever follows. Still, as one of the co-editors of the blog, I wanted to comment on who we are collectively. The guys did not sign off on my remarks, but I think I am accurate here.
Some of you might have experienced that your comments have not appeared on our site. Even as we allow differing views to be presented here and strive to have an open comment policy, we’ve been deleting more comments than usual these days. For one, it’s our blog and we can do what we want. But more, we don’t have time even collectively to respond to the seemingly same group of people making the same arguments on post after post. We all have ministries that require our attention and want to have free and open discussion not endless, fruitless debate. I guess we are just growing a little less tolerant and less willing to give free license to any and all comments. There are certain arguments that we just aren’t going to allow in our comment streams or will give a narrow latitude to. You can read all these counter-points elsewhere on other blogs if you are so inclined.
Also, while we at SBC Voices are diverse in many things, we are decidedly like-minded in a number of things and feel no obligation to be “fair and balanced” on some of these issues. While we represent different views, we often do take a side and are not going to spend a lot of time defending our right to do so. The internet is open, you are free to start your own blog. In the meantime, just know that SBC Voices, while diverse, is unified on a number of key things and while we sometimes allow guest posts, you shouldn’t expect to find many articles that oppose these ideas.
We desire a robust unity in our Convention around biblical theology and the Great Commission. Our authors are made up of Calvinists and non-Calvinists, continuationists and cessationists, churches with elders and pastor-led, small churches and large ones, Southerners and guys from outside the South, Yankees fans and smart people, etc. etc., but we all agree on one thing: we want to work together for the cause of Christ and see the gospel go forth to our communities and to the nations. We believe the BFM2000 is sufficient biblical grounds for unity. We have differing views about politics and policies, about what IMB and NAMB are doing, about evangelistic strategies, about theological matters on tertiary issues, but we ALL want the SBC to be unified around a robust, biblical theology and a commitment to Kingdom work. That means particularly we want to see those who are Calvinists work hand in hand with those who are not. We agree that young Calvinist pastors shouldn’t hide their identity and blow up churches AND we agree that a belief in Calvinist doctrines shouldn’t be used to keep people from serving in leadership and partnership in Baptist work. We don’t care the soteriology of our elected officials or entity heads or committee members, so long as they are FOR unity and not Calvinist combatants or anti-Calvinist combatants. This goes for other fault-lines among Baptists as well. We believe in cooperating for Kingdom work.
We agree that discernment blogging and online polemics often do much more harm than good. We believe in having robust theological discussions. We do not believe that calling out teaching we disagree with on secondary and tertiary issues, or even sloppy exegesis, warrants personally attacking a person or labeling their teaching as heresy. Though we sometimes engage in responding to bad teaching or bad behavior, we agree that blogging that is characterized by always attacking others is generally bad. There are certain blogs in SBC life on both sides of the soteriological divide that we treat as Voldemort – we think they are toxic and we don’t respond to or even talk about them. Not because we always disagree with their conclusions, but we disagree with their rhetoric and conduct toward fellow believers.
We believe that character in leadership matters. We vary in who we supported for president. Some of us voted for Trump and others were never-Trumpers. We all agree that it matters what a candidate or president says or does. We think that it is right to call out those that give unflinching support to a candidate by dismissing immoral behavior as irrelevant, excusing demeaning remarks as locker room talk, and think serial adultery is no big deal and that is not the same as saying that anyone who voted for him was wrong. We also vary on our opinions about particular leaders in SBC life, but we all believe it matters what our Baptist leaders say and do. Each of us has seen leaders we know and love fall in recent months. We grieve at the loss even as we agree that such leaders should be held accountable and do everything to bring them to repentance.
We believe that the SBC should be proactive in including people of color in the highest levels of SBC leadership. We think that we should be actively pursuing diversity in our elected leadership, committees and boards, task forces and entity heads. We believe that we should be moving in that direction in a deliberate and fast pace and that such diversity won’t happen without a clear intentional effort. We have actively campaigned to that end. We believe that a denomination made up of people of various races and ethnicities should be represented by that diversity in its leadership. Pragmatically, we believe that we gain much in fulfilling the Great Commission by the collective wisdom we gain from such shared leadership. Theologically, we think that diversity in the body of Christ is a biblical issue and that we should be pursuing the heavenly vision of One People of God of every tribe, people, tongue, and nation now. We reject the notion that a deliberate pursuit of diversity in leadership and in our churches is liberalism or cultural Marxism. Similarly, but a separate issue…
We believe that we should do all we can to influence our culture and our government to be a just society for all. This includes racial (“social”) justice. While we have varying views of what that should look like practically and in policy, we do believe that we should listen to our brothers and sisters of color and their experiences with racism both individual and systemic. While we don’t see all these issues the same, we do stand firmly on the side of seeking justice for all and being willing to hear and make changes in our society so that minorities are not treated differently in society and in the criminal justice system.
On immigration, we have a variety of views as to application and policy, but we stand in agreement that Baptists should have a love for immigrants and seek a fair and humane immigration policy including finding a solution to the so-called “dreamers.” We think that rhetoric about immigrants should reflect our biblical belief in the imago Dei and that we should refer even to illegal immigrants in terms that reflect their dignity as persons made in the image of God. Again, we reject any notion that biblical justice is Cultural Marxism or Liberalism or Leftism or an embracing of secular concepts like intersectionality. We reject the idea that we are following the culture – in fact, we believe Christians should be leading on this issue. Justice is God’s idea and the pursuit of justice is a biblical mandate.
We agree that women should be treated with respect. We lament that women have been treated in undignified and demeaning ways. We affirm the BFM2000 and what it says about women in ministry. We believe that the pastorate (eldership) should be reserved for men in accordance with Scripture. We also believe that women in SBC life should be free to use their gifts and actively contribute to the life of our church and our Convention.
We lament the abuse that has taken place and been covered up in some churches. We believe that sin should be brought to light and that, however painful, we must affirm and minister to and protect and seek justice for women who have been victims of abuse. We believe that accusations of rape and abuse, though sometimes false are more often true and ALL accusations should be taken seriously. That means that sexual misconduct, assault, abuse, rape must NEVER be swept under the rug. That allegations must be reported to proper authorities to conduct a thorough investigation, even when we find those allegations hard to believe. We believe that we should never ever bully and shame victims. We believe that the care of the abused and bringing sin to light is more important than the short-term consequences to the reputation of the church or a particular leader.
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These are a few of the issues that, if you have been following us for some time, we have generally agreed upon. These are the views you can expect to be presented on a regular basis here. We don’t apologize for that and you shouldn’t expect us to vary from that. We will continue to disagree on a whole host of things and even on how to apply some of these shared values. We welcome discussion of these topics and even pushback in the comment stream, but this is where we stand. Hope that clarifies things a bit.
Another change some of you will notice is that we’ve temporarily disabled our “Recent Comments” plugin. There are some technical and design issues we want to find a better answer for on that, but those are not the major reason we’ve decided to disable it for the next week or two.
We feel like during the busyness of the convention we want to highlight our published content, and won’t be able to monitor or respond to comments as much. This is the best way we can think to make comments less prominent while still allowing them. We’re trying this and seeing how it works. We might decide to turn it back on at any point.
Comments are still on, but the recent comments feature is off for now.
I typically read this blog and even at one point have been a guest blogger. I appreciate the information and opinion that has been shared here, even though I have disagreed with some of it. Thank you Todd for writing this; we have not always seen eye to eye on some things, but you are a good man. It’s good and healthy when people can discuss freely things and not become bitter enemies at the end of the day…
Thanks, Rick. I appreciate those kind words and the feeling is mutual. You are a good man and I am honored to count you among my friends.
Good for you… Good for the blog.
We ddn’t all sign this, but Todd’s right, this is where those of us who have been here and live behind the scenes are. We’re willing to let you say some things, but alongside that, as I saw on Facebook yesterday, people say “SBCVoices said…” when it’s a commenter.
We get called to account for what gets said here, and sometimes we just don’t want to account for certain comments. And we don’t always see everything as connected to a vast conspiracy, either.
This is timely. I generally agree. Disagreement is no big deal to me and not a reason for disallowing comments. There are disagreements that are more like spamming the board with the same stuff and stifling a topic. After the first couple, I see no need to keep going.
There’s not much of a place to engage in respectful disagreements on the things that concern us. The less comments deleted, the better in my view.
And as you know we’re doing our best to be as free and open as we can with the discussion — we (that includes you) think that healthy disagreement and discussion is good.
I’m a recent reader and sometime comment provider. I very much appreciate what I read here almost especially when I disagree in large measure because the dialogue is courteous. These days the comments sections of so many websites offer little more than zingers and one-upping and crude name calling. Thanks for culling out that kind of nonsense.
I have only recently joined the writing team, and I was not aware that Todd was writing this. However, I affirm it. I know that some critics of Voices contend that all the Voices writers are Calvinists but that is not true of me. I don’t think of myself as Calvinist or Traditionalist. When folks ask me about my theology, I just point them to the Baptist Statement of Faith and Message. I believe in it, and it represents the theological guiding star for this blog. Also, it is accurate to say that the directors and writers love the SBC. We want to see it restored to health and effectiveness. We are all mission-minded. We want to further missions both in North America and around the world.
Great idea.
The only thing that could have been stated better was that part about seeking diversity just for the sake of diversity, even if it’s at the expense of Gospel purity. (“Purity first”, James 3:17). It should have been stated this way: “We believe that the SBC should seek out the most Gospel minded individuals for the highest levels of SBC leadership, regardless of their color or ethnicity.” When God brings someone into our path who is Gospel minded, we should not reject them because of their color or ethnicity. Diversity should take a backseat to purity, not vice versa. We should be able to rally around anyone who is Gospel minded, regardless of their pedigree or pigment.
“And the things that you have heard from me among many witnesses, commit these to FAITHFUL men [faithfulness to the Gospel is of first importance, higher than diversity in skin color] who will be able to teach others also” (2 Timothy 2:22).
Let God decide how the SBC should look. To loosly paraphrase the words of John 21:22, “If I want the SBC to be predominantly one color, what business of yours is that? Your job is to elect the most Gospel minded men into leadership, and leave the color thing to me.”